Do you know how many Filipinos invest in stocks and how many of them trade online? Come on, take a guess.
Ten million Filipinos? One million?
Believe it or not, the answer is actually much lower.
How to open a BPITrade account
Those interested to trade stocks in the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) can choose to employ a live broker or an online stock brokerage firm. Either method has its own advantages and disadvantages and will be the subject of a separate article in the future.
For now, we’ll focus on online stock trading platforms. A list of available online stockbrokers in the Philippines can be found in this link.
Two of the most popular online stock trading platform providers are CitisecOnline (COL) and BPITrade. We have previously explained how to open a Citisec stock trading account. In this article, we will discuss how to open a BPITrade account.
Online trading link of 4 ASEAN stock markets
I read on the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) website today that there is a current proposal among four (4) Southeast Asian countries to interconnect their stock markets.
According to the press release, the trading link which is expected to electronically interconnect the stock markets of the Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand and Singapore will most probably go live by the end of 2011.
List of Online Stockbrokers in the Philippines
If you’ve already finished the first parts of our Stock Trading tutorial, you probably know by now the different types of securities being traded, how profits in the stock market are made, how much is needed to start trading, and what types of stock orders you can make.
The next step now is to choose a stockbroker.
Philippine stock market lost 9% in January 2008
If you placed money in the Philippine stock market from the beginning of January this year, you would have already lost 9% by now.
That translates to a million pesos worth only P910,000 as of January 31.
This is based on the performance of the Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi), a basket of 30 listed common stocks representing the overall movement of market prices and the general state of the Philippine economy.
Exercise your Metro Pacific warrants and earn 335%
Metro Pacific Corporation (Stock Code: MPI) announced that its stock warrants acquired through tender offer or purchased in the open market can now be exercised and converted to MPI common shares.
The stock warrants, issued on October 23, 2006, can be converted to MPI common stock at a price of P1.00 per share until December 14.
With MPI’s stock closing at P4.35 on December 12, if you converted those warrants, you are are technically earning P3.35 per share or 335% from the conversion price. That, however, is still gross of associated fees, taxes, and the warrant acquisition cost.